protevangelium

“This sacred rite was instituted in connection with the _protevangelium_ given to our first parents; it was diffused among the nations by tradition, and has been kept alive as a general, and, indeed, almost universal observance, by that deep sense of sin, and consciousness of guilt, and personal urgency of the need of a reconciliation, which are so clearly displayed in Grecian mythology.”

Christianity and Greek Philosophy or, the relation between spontaneous and reflective thought in Greece and the positive teaching of Christ and His Apostles